Euro Chicago Map

Tournament Taverns. Euro Rooms. A Slovenian Bar.

I am not the biggest soccer fan, but I do love the global excitement and fleeting epicness of the larger tournaments such as the World Cup. This summer, we get to experience a few of these sort of events with the summer Olympics, Copa America, and, starting today, the Euro 2024 Soccer tournament which will be playing out in Germany for the next month or so.

I’m the sort of person who needs the various layers of soccer explained to me—the leagues, the tiers, the tournaments, city teams, country teams, etc. As I understand it, this particular tournament only occurs every four years and is exclusive to the European countries. Actually, not all European countries get to participate. Only the 24 that qualified of the 44 European countries. So the usual stalwarts like England, Spain, and the Netherlands are there next to some up-and-comers like Slovakia or Georgia. But some familiar friends like Ireland, Greece, and Sweden have to watch from home.

Unfortunately, I won’t be romping around Germany during this tournament trying to scavenge up bags of Haribo and downing liters of Krombacher. But here in Chicago, there’s plenty of places to find passionate fans tuning in to every match. There are some world class soccer bars in the city, but its also fun to seek out an enclave that has roots in the home country. The kind of place that pulls a TV out onto the sidewalk for the match. The Roman pizza place for the Italy match. The Scottish Pub for the Scotland match. The Slovenian bar for the Slovenian match. (Yes, there’s a Slovenian bar in Chicago).

Anyways, this tournament starts today and wraps on July 14 with matches on most days in between. Click below for a map I made of some Chicago bars and restaurants that pair with the countries competing in the Euro…